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Joker 3
|- abp="543" | abp="544" style="text-align: center;"|View Gallery |} The origins of the Joker are not fully explained in'' The Dark Knight''. Throughout the movie, the Joker tells others of how he acquired the scars present around his mouth. He repeats two stories. The first is to the crime lord Gambol, about his father being a drunk and abusing his mother. The Joker states that one night his father starts abusing his mother as he, a young boy, sits in the corner watching in terror. His father sees him cowering and asks "Why So Serious?", which turns out to be one of the Joker's trademark lines. After his father says this to him, he cuts the young, soon to be Joker's face in the shape of a smile so he would never look so serious. An alternate version of the tale is one he tells to Rachel Dawes, about his wife getting cut up by loan sharks whom she owned money to but could not undergo surgery due to the expenses. In turn he takes a razor blade and cut his mouth to prove to her that he doesn't care about scars, and that he just wants to see her smile again. He then states that she hated the sight of him and no matter how much he missed her, he was always smiling. He prepares to tell Batman the story behind his scars, but Batman incapacitates him before he has the opportunity. Given the Joker's obvious mania, neither version of the origin can be considered reliable. Also, inside the police station, the Joker's fingerprints and teeth find no match, and his suits are tailor-made, so no one can trace his name. Skills & Abilities *Criminal Mastermind *'Hand-to-Hand Combat (Advanced)' *'Psychology' *'Intimidation' *'Marksman' Weakness *Mental Illness Equipment * Custom clothes with his preferred choice of knives, guns, and other various, high end, exotic military hardware and weaponry * Various stolen vehicles and one known as the "Joker's Van." * Various bladed weapons, usually knives, though he has also been shown to be deadly with a pencil as well. The Joker also employs a few crudely made explosives and specially designed hand grenades. Trivia *This version of the Joker appears in the 2008 Warner Bros. film [http://dc.wikia.com/wiki/Dark_Knight_(Movie) The Dark Knight] and was portrayed by Heath Ledger. This iteration of the character is purported to be the darkest version of the Joker to date Heath Ledger is the third actor to bring the character of the Joker to the big screen. The first was Cesar Romero in the 1966 film Batman. Jack Nicholson played the character in the 1989 film. Ledger's Joker made a behind-the-scenes appearance at the close of 2005's Batman Begins. *Unlike all other versions of the Joker (both in print and theatrical), Ledger's incarnation is the only Joker who is specifically known to wear makeup to create his identity as the Joker. He adopts the makeup as his "natural" face, and refuses to clean off and reapply the clown makeup in successive scenes which causes the material to continually decay and gives him a more unkempt appearance as the film progresses. There is only one scene where the Joker can be seen without any makeup. During the memorial service for Commissioner Loeb, the Joker masquerades as a police officer in an effort to assassinate Mayor Anthony Garcia. *Another aspect of this version of the Joker is that the he seems to be able to hold his own in a fight against Batman. During their first confrontation, the Joker manages to lay a few hits upon Batman. During the Joker and Batman's final confrontation, the Joker becomes extremely provoked by Batman and manages to beat down and subdue him. The Joker beats Batman so hard, using fists and a steel pipe that he causes Batman's sonar-vision to malfunction, temporarily blinding him, and giving the Joker an even greater advantage. *Unlike all his counterpart this Joker does not have his famous Joker Venom *In The Dark Knight Rises, the Joker is neither mentioned or seen in any way. This was out of respect for Heath Ledger. However, in the novel version of The Dark Knight Rises, it is suggested that the Joker is a lone inmate at Arkham Asylum and may have escaped before Bane's revolution. *The Joker was Heath Ledger's final completed performance, having done all his work on the movie shortly before his death in January 2008. (He was working on another movie, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus at the time of his death.) *The viral marketing for The Dark Knight was initially centered on the Joker, with news on the movie released in http://WhySoSerious.com . This changed after Ledger's death, with Harvey Dent becoming the new focus. *Ledger's performance gave him a posthumous Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.